Lonegan Questions : Were Booker’s Law Firm Payouts Illegal?

Cory Booker file photo by Boyd Loving

Lonegan Questions : Were Booker’s Law Firm Payouts Illegal?
September 18m 2013

“Cory Booker claims he separated from the law firm, but he has kept the separation agreement secret, if there even is one,” Lonegan said. “The public has not seen any document or any other evidence that he is not still an employee of the law firm.”

WEST ORANGE, NJ – Mayor Steve Lonegan, Republican candidate for the United States Senate, challenged Cory Booker to disclose his purported separation agreement with the law firm Trenk DiPasquale because serious questions have been raised concerning the firm’s contracts totaling over $2 million with Newark, while Booker was mayor. Most disturbingly, Booker has reportedly received hundreds of thousands of dollars in private payments from the firm at the same time these lucrative contracts were awarded by his Administration.

“Cory Booker claims he separated from the law firm, but he has kept the separation agreement secret, if there even is one,” Lonegan said. “The public has not seen any document or any other evidence that he is not still an employee of the law firm.”

The evidence available indicates he is still an employee and includes reports that:

Booker continued to receive substantial checks from Trenk DiPasquale from 2007 to 2011;
Booker received a 50% raise from Trent DiPasquale in 2009, long after he allegedly separated from the firm; and
Booker indicated on his tax returns that he ‘materially participated’ in the law firm while mayor.

Lonegan said that in light of all this evidence, “Cory Booker should publish his separation agreement to show that these payouts were not kickbacks.”

In criticizing Booker for awarding taxpayer-funded contracts to the firm, Lonegan cited the American Bar Association’s Model Code of Professional Responsibility (EC 9-6), which requires that every lawyer must “strive to avoid not only professional impropriety but also the appearance of impropriety.” He also cited New Jersey statute 40:73-2, which says:

40:73-2. No officer or employee to be interested in contracts

No officer or employee, elected or appointed in any such municipality shall be interested, directly or indirectly, in any contract or job for work or materials, or the profits thereof, or services to be furnished or performed for the municipality, and no such officer or employee shall be interested, directly or indirectly, in any contract or job for work or materials or the profits thereof, or services to be furnished or performed, for any person operating interurban railway, street railway, gas works, waterworks, electric light or power plant, heating plant, telegraph line, telephone exchange, or other public utility within the territorial limits of the municipality.

“Newark awarding these contracts while Booker was mayor certainly has the appearance of impropriety,” Lonegan said. “If Cory Booker received Trenk DiPasquale payoffs because he shuffled taxpayer-funded business their way, it is truly disheartening and potentially criminal. As an attorney, Cory Booker should know what the appearance of impropriety is, and it certainly exists here.”